The present invention relates generally to computer systems, and more specifically to translation of files containing structured information and translatable components.
One type of file containing structured information is known as an Extensible Markup Language (“XML”) file. As known to those skilled in the art, XML is a meta-language for documents. XML provides a way of defining structured information containing content, such as text and graphics, and an indication of how such content may be used. Due to its inherent flexibility, XML may be used to describe structures for a wide range of data types. XML files have thus become a widely adopted format for exchanging various types of data for example on the Internet.
An XML file may often include translatable components (i.e. elements or attributes) in the structured information, typically in one source language. With the global reach of the Internet, it is often desirable to have the translatable components in an XML file translated from the source language to one of a number of selected destination languages. A difficulty with translating XML files is that, due to their inherent flexibility, one XML file may have a structure, which is quite different from that of another XML file. Consequently, it may be difficult to identify translatable components in an XML document, and the results of a translation may not be satisfactory.
What is needed is a design for translating files containing structured information and translatable components, which at least partially addresses the difficulty described above.